Syria Attacks Evidence as U.N. Case Turns More Bizarre

By MICHAEL SLACKMAN; Souad Mekhennet contributed reporting from Beirut for this article, and Katherine Zoepf from Damascus.

Published: December 7, 2005

The United Nations investigation into the assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister, Rafik Hariri, is beginning to show some cracks: one witness is dead, another is in jail and still another has recanted his testimony with a fantastic story of abduction, drugging and bribery.

In a case that has begun to sound more and more like a fictional spy thriller, with charges of Soviet-style intimidation tactics and a witness who died when his car ran off a road, the issue of witness credibility has risen to the forefront. While it is too soon to draw any firm conclusions on how the new developments will affect the investigation, they have at least raised questions about the validity of crucial evidence supporting the charge that the Syrian state was responsible for Mr. Hariri's assassination, according to Western diplomats based in Syria and a draft of an interim report by the United Nations investigator, Detlev Mehlis.

A month ago, Syrian officials were reeling, accused by investigators of complicity in the killing and fearful that the Security Council would demand that they hand over some of Syria's most powerful people or face crushing economic sanctions and international isolation. But now, it is Syrian on the offensive, undercutting credibility of witnesses and diluting charges that Syria has refused to cooperate by sending officials to Vienna for questioning.

And more troubling news seems to be on the way, as Mr. Mehlis prepares to make his final presentation to the Security Council by Dec. 15. Two people who work for a Syrian government agency said Tuesday that another witness would soon recant his testimony, claiming he was bribed with half a million dollars by Lebanese officials to level charges against Syrian officials.

The two people who said they had heard the new claims from the witness -- who they said called himself Abu George -- insisted on anonymity out of fear of retribution for undermining official plans to spring this development at a time most embarrassing to the investigation.

At the moment, Syrians are enjoying the spectacle of Hussam Taher Hussam, the rail-thin 30-year-old known as ''the masked witness,'' who outed himself recently with outlandish claims to have given false testimony after being kidnapped, tortured and offered $1.3 million in bribes by Lebanese officials -- charges that even critics of the investigation say are hard to believe.

Security agents escorted Mr. Hussam into a hotel room on Monday to recount for a reporter a tale that exonerates him and Syrian officials of all wrongdoing while implicating Syria's chief enemies in the killing and subsequent conspiracy to frame Damascus. He repeatedly boasted about his ability to mislead people.

''No, they are not dumb,'' Mr. Hussam said of the investigators, who he said never doubted his account of events even after questioning him dozens of times. ''I am smarter. I penetrated through all of them. I am proud of it. I penetrated through all of them, and I acted well.''

Regardless of which of his versions -- if either one -- of his accounts are true, his change of tune presents a complication for the investigation. He is the witness who implicated the president's brother-in-law, Asef Shawkut, in planning the murder, and reported seeing the van packed with explosives that was used in the assassination, according to Western diplomats based in Syria and a draft of the report that officials said was inadvertently released by the United Nations.

He is also the witness who apparently told the commission that an officer told him ''there soon would be an earthquake that would rewrite the history of Lebanon.''

A European diplomat based in Damascus, who asked for anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly, said: ''He definitely has a credibility problem. You cannot trust this guy. How did Mehlis trust this guy?''

A senior State Department official said the United States had no evidence that Mr. Mehlis's investigation was encountering problems and warned that Syria was waging a ''concerted effort to cast doubt on the Mehlis investigation.'' He said allegations about the recanting of one witness's testimony and other problems did not constitute anything like evidence that the Mehlis inquiry was running into trouble, as Syria says.

Mr. Mehlis, who said Monday he is leaving the investigation after his final report, said many of the setbacks were to be expected in such a complex investigation. Ultimately, he said, it will all have to be sorted out by a tribunal that will weigh the evidence and the contradictory statements given by individual witnesses.

Mr. Mehlis also said Mr. Hussam was an important witness, and said he expected that he would be summoned to Lebanon for follow-up questioning.

''That is why we put on paper what people tell us,'' Mr. Mehlis said in a discussion of the case in his Beirut office on Monday. ''That is why we let them read what we put on paper. That is why after reading it, we let them sign it. That's why we have asked them: 'Have you been threatened? Have you been given promises? Have you been offered or given money?' And we let them read it and let them sign it, because it unfortunately happens that people die, that people get killed, that people get sick, or change their minds on what they have told us.''